Study Shows Mobile Holiday Email Opens Nearly Equal Desktop Opens

Have you ever opened one of your own marketing emails on your smartphone? How about on a tablet? Android? iPhone? You may not be doing it, but your customers are.

New numbers from Knotice (say that three times fast) show that mobile opens have risen dramatically in the past year, to the point where they almost match desktop opens.

Cyber Week is the term they’re using to cover the dates beginning the Tuesday before Thanksgiving and ending on Cyber Monday. Mobile opens are up from 30.50% to 44.75% year over year.

The breakdown goes like this: Smartphones 28.22% / Tablets 16.54%.

That’s a small bump up for smartphones but tablets are up from only 8.33% last year. Just about double the usage and tablets still aren’t all that common in US households. Imagine where we’ll be in a couple of years when tablets become as common as smartphones or even computers.

Another part of the report I found interesting was email opens broken down by time of day.

The text is hard on the eyes, but the color bars pretty much explain the whole story. Blue for phones, yellow for tablets.

Tablet email opens hit a high point at 6 to 7 in the morning. As I’ve mentioned before, I’ve gotten into the habit of checking my email on my tablet first thing so I can pre-sort my mail and get a jump on anything important. Looks like that’s becoming common practice among us tablet addicts.

Tablet usage slows through the workday, proving that most of us leave our little buddies at home and turn to our smartphones for comfort. In the evening, those tablets come back into play. What’s really crazy is that 1 am is a busy email time for all kinds of mobile devices. Really, we all need to learn to unplug. On second thought, this includes Black Friday where people get up at 1 am to get the best deals, so they were probably reading emails while waiting in line at the Walmart.

Clearly, we need to think mobile when we think email. It would be foolish to ignore that segment of the population. It could be that the emails you’re sending out open just fine on an iPhone or iPad. But wouldn’t you like to be sure? One major difference is screen space. If your email messages make full use of a wide desktop monitor, they probably aren’t having the same impact on mobile. A pet peeve of mine? Links that are two close together. On a desktop with a mouse, no problem, but tapping on a small screen is an entirely different action. If you want me to click through, I need big, bold links that don’t bump into each other.

You don’t have to invest in fancy testing or focus groups. Simply ask your friends and family what devices they use. I’ll bet you can come up with all the major players without straying far from home.

Do you have a tip for effective mobile email messages? We’d love to hear it.

http://www.e-shot.net/ Alex Dumpfree

Thanks Cynthia. Very helpful research post. Nowadays, mobile market is on the rise pacing. Whatever strategy you are culturing in right now, mobile market is of primary consideration.